Construction On January 15, 1857, Governor
Coles Bashford wrote to the legislature that the existing Capitol was inadequate in size for the growing state and that it lacked fireproof storage facilities for state records. He suggested that the Capitol should either be renovated or relocated, possibly to a different city. To prevent such a move, in a campaign led by
Horace A. Tenney, the city of Madison offered to cover most of the costs of a $100,000 expansion (equivalent to $ in ) to the Capitol, asking the state to spend $25,000 for its part. The motion to reconsider passed by one vote, the total being 39–38. On the second vote, Knowlton and two other assemblymen changed their votes, while some other members who had been absent for the first vote joined in, leading to a total of 41 votes in favor and 41 against. Since the vote was tied, the bill was not adopted, and Madison remained the state capital. The first phase of the new building, the East Wing, was completed in 1859. The Assembly promptly moved into the East Wing's large chamber, leaving the Senate in the old building. The building was completed in 1869, with the fourth and final North Wing housing the Wisconsin Supreme Court and the State Library. However, the landscaping plan never came to fruition, in part because most of the region's stonemasons were busy rebuilding Chicago after its
Great Fire of 1871, and in part because of controversy over the decision to put up an iron fence around the square. Where Cleveland had proposed four fountains and a
bandshell, only one fountain was built, a copy of the famed
Centennial Fountain in Philadelphia.
Expansion, 1882–1884 Finding that the building had again become inadequate in size, the legislature appropriated $200,000 in 1882 (equivalent to $ in ) to expand the north and south wings of the Capitol. Witnesses to the disaster included a young
Frank Lloyd Wright, who later wrote that the experience continued to haunt him throughout his life and his career as an architect. The
inquest into the cause of the accident was led by Dane County district attorney and future Governor
Robert M. La Follette. Prominent architectural firms such as
McKim, Mead & White and
George B. Post & Sons were invited to submit designs, but declined due to the project's small size and low budget. One who did take an interest was
Cass Gilbert, previously the architect of the
Minnesota State Capitol. On the night of February 26, 1904, a gas jet ignited a newly varnished ceiling in the Capitol. Although the building had an advanced fire-fighting system, the nearby
University of Wisconsin–Madison's reservoir, which supplied the Capitol, was empty, allowing the fire to spread substantially before the switch to alternative city water supplies could be made. Madison firefighters could not handle the blaze on their own, so additional men and equipment had to be brought from
Milwaukee. The effectiveness of the reinforcements was initially hampered by very cold temperatures; by the time they reached Madison, their equipment had frozen and needed to be thawed. As a result, the entire structure, except the north wing, was completely gutted. Numerous records, books, and historical artifacts were lost, including the mount of
Old Abe, a
Civil War mascot. However, through the efforts of university students, much of the state law library was saved. The priceless artifacts collected by the State Historical Society were unaffected, as that agency had moved into a new building of its own in 1900. The fire occurred just after the state legislature had voted to cancel the Capitol's fire insurance policy as a cost-saving measure, resulting in unprotected losses of nearly one million dollars. ==Current building==